Posts by: Leonidas
Last week, we featured several stories on the abusive efforts of a Republican prosecutor to silence and intimidate a school superintendent who criticized Governor John Kasich’s school funding plan.
We highlighted the story of Arnol Elam, Superintendent of Franklin City Schools. Elam sent a letter to the parents and teachers of his district which said, in part, that “Governor John Kasich was untruthful . . . and in doing so, finally clarified that kids in poor school districts don’t count.”
Things got interesting when a Republican prosecutor told the media that he was opening a criminal investigation into the letter [...]
Full Story... →What’s the best way to avoid a criminal investigation in Ohio? Be a Republican.
What’s the best way to have a prosecutor dig through your life? Criticize John Kasich.
Recent news makes it seem to be that simple.
Joesph highlighted the case of Beth Trombold who was recently appointed to the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO). Because some of the spots on PUCO are reserved for Democrats or Independents, party affiliation is important.
The Plain Dealer explains what happened:
Trombold, of Columbus, called herself a Republican when she applied for a different vacancy on the regulatory panel [...]
Full Story... →The Warren County Prosecuting Attorney is looking into whether a Franklin City Schools Superintendent violated the law when he sent a letter home earlier this week urging parents to join him “in an active campaign to ensure Gov. (John) Kasich and any legislator who supports him are not re-elected.”
Joseph had the details of the story yesterday.
Now we learn that Warren County Prosecutor David Fornshell was investigating the letter written by Arnold Elam.
Fornshell, according to the Dayton Daily News, is apparently looking into whether Elam violated a newly enacted law against using public resources for political [...]
Full Story... →It gets plenty silly at points, and you may find yourself saying “What the hell am I watching?” Just go with it. If you take it too seriously, you’ll be sorely disappointed.
— Plunderbund Quiz: Is this a review of a The Belly of the Beast, a Steven Seagal direct-to-video, or is it a conservative reacting to John Kasich explaining why he is embracing Obamacare and expanding Medicaid?
John Kasich wants to be President.
In order to accomplish this goal, he needs to make the far right wing [...]
Full Story... →The Drudge Report and Fox News are famous for their partisan slant in news coverage while maintaining the façade of honest news coverage. This is done most insidiously not by printing biased news articles, but in the choices the media makes in which stores to cover.
It’s called Agenda Setting.
A great example is found in Sunday’s Dispatch.com. The editors of the Dispatch hold the ability to drive the Ohio political conversation with what they chooses to highlight in their paper and – more importantly – on their webpage.
So how are [...]
Full Story... →John Kasich loves to talk about prison reform.
The two big ideas were sentencing reform, so that non-violent offenders were sent to rehabilitation instead of a cell, and privatizing state facilities.
There should be no mistake that the motive behind these reforms was money. Kasich had no interest in whether it was a good idea to provide people with treatment instead of just locking them up, for example. “Corrections reform is critical [to the budget]. It’s one of the big cost sinks that we have,” he said before taking office.
When the sentencing reform bill was signed, Kasich’s prison [...]
Full Story... →Attorney General Mike DeWine has stepped into the middle of the Steubenville rape case. He then stuck his foot firmly in his mouth.
The Attorney General’s Office is handling the investigation of a terrible sexual assault on a juvenile last August. The victim allegedly was assaulted multiple times after she passed out a party. Two juveniles are charged with rape. The New York Times did an excellent story, titled “Rape Case Unfolds Online and Divides Steubenville.” Later, a group of hackers – likely connected with “Anonymous”—hacked sites connected to the case. Because the crime occurred at a several parties, [...]
Full Story... →Governor John Kasich’s upcoming trip to Mexico has brought us the first great moment of 2013 in Ohio journalism.
Gov. John Kasich is traveling to the World Economic Forum in Switzerland later this month. There, according to the Cincinnati Enquirer, Kasich will meet, greet, and schmooze “some of the world’s richest and most powerful people.”
We aren’t talking about how the media is totally dropping the ball on the big story: Kasich has created a loophole in Ohio’s ethics and public records laws through JobsOhio to allow big donors to pay for international travel for administration officials without any [...]
Full Story... →Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine and Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters have apparently joined in calls for school districts to consider allowing teachers and staff members to carry guns on school grounds. The Republicans seem to favor not only having armed police officers in the schools, but also having guns available for teachers and administrators.
We have heard the same thing from friends and family. A similar proposal was floated in Tennessee, and it seems like our Facebook page was full of this sort of proposal all weekend.
We are, to put it mildly, skeptical. But what do [...]
Full Story... →The details of Kasich’s Turnpike Plan are still emerging. Yet we know enough now to question whether the plan is constitutional.
Two aspects of the plan raise significant issues under the U.S. Constitution.
First, in an effort to placate possible opposition in Northern Ohio, different rates will be charged for those making short, as opposed to longer trips. Second, money from tolls will be used for projects unrelated to the Turnpike.
Hang on tight, because we are going deep into Constitutional Law and the Commerce Clause. This is a complicated area of law – known as the “Dormant Commerce Clause” [...]
Full Story... →If we didn’t have a guy like Secretary of State Husted around, we would probably have to invent him.
Husted has finally admitted what we all knew: voter fraud in Ohio is rare, if not practically non-existent. Here is the reporting from the Cincinnati Enquirer:
Vote fraud, [Husted said], “is a very rare occurrence,” despite claims from far-right groups and others to the contrary. While county boards of elections throughout Ohio currently are investigating hundreds of cases in which individuals tried to vote twice, Husted said he does not regard that as evidence that fraud is a significant problem [...]
Full Story... →Get Email Updates
PB Twitter Feed
- No public Twitter messages.
Advertisement
Advertisement
